Listen to the New M. Ward Album

NPR has the new M. Ward record streaming in its entirety this week; go here to listen to A Wasteland Companion, which comes out April 10. The record was recorded partly in Portland (with local musicians and longtime collaborators Mike Coykendall and Adam Selzer, among others) but also all over the country: Omaha, New York City, Los Angeles, Austin, and a session in Bristol, UK. From the Merge Records page:

Inspired by his increasingly itinerant lifestyle Ward set forth to create something of a musical travelogue. He explains, "Between now and when I made Hold Time there has been a lot of traveling which requires a lot of reckoning with what to leave behind and what to carry - material and otherwise - and thinking about what I want versus what I need, creatively and otherwise. I wanted to get a reflection of that on the album. It was a process of stripping away my security blanket, which is the same four walls I always record in."

Prefix also has an extended interview up with Ward this morning. He's playing Coachella and Sasquatch, but as yet no Portland concert dates are scheduled.